NBC News is reporting that President Trump wants Attorney General help track down the author of the notorious op-ed:
President Donald Trump said Friday he wanted Attorney General Jeff Sessions to launch an investigation into who authored the explosive anonymous opinion article published in The New York Times earlier this week.
“Jeff should be investigating who the author of that piece was, because I really believe it’s national security,” Trump told reporters aboard Air Force One.
The op-ed writer, identified only as a senior administration official, said some members of the administration are trying to thwart Trump as part of a “resistance.”
Steve Benen remarks:
The trouble, of course, is that Trump’s call doesn’t make much sense. In order for the New York Times opinion piece to warrant scrutiny from the attorney general, there would need to be some kind of evidence of a federal crime. There isn’t. We’ve all read the op-ed and it does not describe illegal misconduct.
It also doesn’t point to any national security threats, unless one is inclined to accept the op-ed author’s concerns at face value and conclude that having an unfit president is itself a national security threat.
I think the first paragraph of Steve’s analysis is a mis-fire, or a mis-print. The question is whether the letter itself is illegal.
But remember the flavor of the moment a few weeks ago, Non-Disclosure Agreements (NDAs) signed by White House staffers? It’s possible that Trump wants Sessions to investigate for abrogation of those agreements. Once again, Trump tramps close to a precedent he’d hate if he tries to punish a transgression of a questionable legal agreement, because a court might easily find those agreements to be non-binding.
But, given the insulting picture it paints of the President, how can he not lose his cool on this letter? It’s probable, as I’m sure many other observers have noted, that the author of that op-ed is intentionally provoking the President in hopes of alienating his base, or committing a political crime gross enough to bring Congress back to its senses.
I think this chances of either happening are miniscule.
And, on a less serious note, I’m having mad visuals of the only way the author will be found by Trump is if the guy can’t repress his giggling at his desk.
